Benchmarks, ungraded.

[learnteach]

Students are taking benchmarks today.  I don't know why we bother; the teachers have given up respecting the benchmarks (they don't sync with the teaching guides if you have them, so in most cases the tests are worthless.)   Last year I fought the battle all year, finding problems in the tests, commenting on them, etc.   This year, the person in charge of them is new and hasn't fixed any of the problems (the last guy just ran from the job.   Did great meeting (not, but thought he did) but not at all good on delivery.)

Type your cut contents here.

WHY am I wasting my time?  The students know the test doesn't count, and the ones who are having a hard time caring just bubble it in and hand it up.  This is supposed to prepare for the NCLB testing at the end of the year, but it's truly bad practice.   The students just learn again that authority doesn't have a clue, and I'm left babysitting the remainders.  

Doesn't help that I came in to do Physics, but the security guard switched classes around on me because the other sub is known to be weak and the physics classes better behaved.   Oh wonderful.


Why am I wasting my time?

Comments

[nevynn.livejournal.com]

I don't know how honest you are allowed to be with the students, but if you know the NCLB tests are crud, all you can do is remind them that the best they can do is the best they can do, and you encourage them to strive for that. Even push what they thought were their limits.
That is comming from someone who is only now getting around to his GED, and was suffering from math/geometry terms boucing around in his head, and keeping him from sleep a couple nights ago. *laughs*

allergicone is right.. Because You want to be there, for the ones who want to be there, and you know who they are.

[sbuchler.livejournal.com]

to answer your last question; paycheck.

:-S Warm fuzzies!

teaching in an unteachable world

[kahnegabs.livejournal.com]

As a teacher myself, I'm confident that it is way more than "paycheck" with learnteach. He's a natural teacher who isn't being allowed to teach naturally (no one is, these days, and it's heart-breaking to care so much and be able to do only a little.

It's my belief that he still hasn't lost hope that he CAN do some good, and that that is why he continues. That's why most teachers continue, even when the state and NCLB has made it nearly impossible.

Good luck to you LearnTeach!

Re: teaching in an unteachable world

[martianfencer.livejournal.com]

Some people are allowed to teach naturally. We just don't get a paycheck for it.

Re: teaching in an unteachable world

[(Anonymous)]

The beauty of homeschooling!
Your girls have been very lucky to have you!

hehehehe.

[learnteach.livejournal.com]

OMGWTF no BBQ. A day of subbing (8 to 3:30) earns 125 before taxes. 7 1/2 hours, not counting transit, means that it's an hourly rate of 16.67 dollars. I make more doing migrant laborer house repair, much less anything related to engineering.

It's not the money; it can't be. Teachers do it for love (or security) all the way up to the University level. Increasingly, you can't get either, and people wonder why it's hard to get decent teachers?

Re: hehehehe.

[martianfencer.livejournal.com]

I believe it is the occasional "Aha!" lighting up a student's face. Despite the stupidity of the administration. And security guards. And the crummy pay and the lack of respect.

Re: hehehehe.

[(Anonymous)]

Lots of us who might have taught didn't go into it because the jobs were scarce or in places we didn't want to be. No matter how great the entry level salaries were, I didn't want to teach in the LA Unified District straight out of undergrad, on an emergency credential. After I finished my Masters, there wasn't much of a market for my sort of expertise (music programs were being cut, and I would have had to spend at least another year, probably two, to get my secondary credential), and so I kept working the food service and secretary angle... I've never worked in my degree field. *LOL*

It's sad, so many people I know who might have gone into teaching then just ditched it and did something else, because we could see where things were headed...